officials across the caribbean have ordered people to prepare for one of the strongest storms ever recorded in the atlantic. hurricane irma is now an extremely dangerous category five storm, with winds of nearly 300 kilometres an hour. it's currently heading for the virgin islands and puerto rico. there have been protests in many american cities at president trump's scrapping of the scheme protecting undocumented child migrants from deportation. he says he's hopeful congress will find a long—term solution. barack obama, who brought in the scheme, has called the decision cruel and wrong. the un is warning of a humanitarian crisis in bangladesh because of a dramatic increase in rohingya muslims fleeing neighbouring myanmar. fighting in rakhine state has left hundreds dead. at least 35,000 refugees fled in a single day. now on bbc news, hardtalk. welcome to hardtalk. i am stephen

sackur. there is a special breed of business leaders who acquire a public profile far beyond their core business. think of donald trump, richard branson, and many others. is a flamboyant richard branson, and many others. is a fla m boya nt style richard branson, and many others. is a flamboyant style and versification into sport and media necessarily good for the bottom line? my guest todayis good for the bottom line? my guest today is one of asia's best—known businessmen, tony fernandes, boss of airasia, formula 1 investor, football owner, and dabbler in reality tv. is it easy to lose sight of what matters most to the success of what matters most to the success of business? tony fernandes, welcome to hardtalk.

thank you very much. you have been in business for three decades now. is the tony fernandes that does business today different from the young man who set out?” business today different from the young man who set out? i had to think a little bit smarter, a little bit older and wiser, but in principle the same tony fernandes from 30 years ago. what about the attitude to risk? umm, maybe a little bit more cautious, thinking ita little bit more cautious, thinking it a bit more. but overall i don't see much difference. i think decisions have to be made critically. i think changing management is critical, especially in this day and age, and sometimes procrastination, analysis, paralysis by analysis, is a detriment to business. that is what i call it. i

talk to my management team all the time about changing and adapting quickly. one of the fascinating things about you is cultural as much as business. you, and i said it in the introduction, you made your fortune and your name by introducing a new form of cheaper budget aviation travel to asia. and you are of course proud to be again. and yet as people listen to your voice in the attitudes as well, you seem culturally quite western educated, in the uk, working for branson for a while. —— asian. do you see yourself asa while. —— asian. do you see yourself as a combination of east and west? yeah. i never thoughti as a combination of east and west? yeah. i never thought i would work in malaysia. but business is business. i have the ability to be a chameleon. you can put me in any

pa rt chameleon. you can put me in any part of the world, china, korea, humour is humour, businesses business... is that really true? from the little time i spent in cultures like japan, for example, it struck me, not speaking japanese, but japanese business culture is fundamentally quite different to europe. that is true, that is true, but alcohol is a great leveller.m is also big in those countries. fine, social occasions, i bring to business a lot of the relationship. much of it is done socially. creating relationships goes beyond the office. it doesn't matter if you are injapan, india, the middle east, people would say they want all

the frills, low—cost will never work, they say. they are surprised. when you get something injapan they wrap it in 35 pieces of paper. but if you strip it down, people want simplicity and a low fare, and... did you make enemies in asia? you brought a european model of airlines to asia. be transformed it. you had seen what 0'leary was doing in the us and the uk with southwest airlines. i wonder how much difficulty you had persuading asian consumers and governments there was a market for a low—budget concept in asia. consumers were easy. governments were much tougher. in oui’ governments were much tougher. in our part of the world, governments own the national carrier is 90% of the time and the airports. i am only beginning, after 15 years, people

are starting to say, wow, this will make a difference to our economy. but it has been hard and we made many enemies, definitely. also, you learn some of your marketing skills at the feet of richard branson, working quite a while for virgin records. was he an inspiration for you? you records. was he an inspiration for you ? you model yourself records. was he an inspiration for you? you model yourself on his iconoclastic approach to business?” a lwa ys iconoclastic approach to business?” always say the last person i want to be is richard because i have no preconception of going into a balloon at dirty 6000 feet, or even a balloon... -- 36,000 he was definitely an inspiration. he challenged the norm. he set up

ai ratla nta challenged the norm. he set up airatla nta to do challenged the norm. he set up airatlanta to do something different against british airways at that time. anyone who said he was not inspirational who worked for him, they are lying. he set a new paradigms. he challenged the establishment. in some ways that affected me. and he also saw there was a value to projecting a very strong personal rant to drive the business. —— brand. have you done that yourself? that came out of necessity. we had no money when we started airasia. my marketing director said we have to make some controversial statements. they will ta ke controversial statements. they will take photographs of you. i am a gregarious person anyway. it wasn't difficult to do that. ego-driven business can go too far. 100%. as business can go too far. 10096. as soon as used start believing your own press, that is the end of his. let us talk about the fine line between being a successful brand

yourself, using that to drive your business, looking like an egomaniac, let's look at you in 2013, like donald trump, you wanted to get into the business of reality tv. here is a promotional video of a show he launched in 2013. he asks the hard questions. whose fault is this? he is very sharp? either ganging up a new? it was messy. who is telling the truth? it is a disaster. and he will fire someone. i have had enough. you are fired. tony fernandes. compared to donald trump you are actually quite polite. fernandes. compared to donald trump you are actually quite politem fernandes. compared to donald trump you are actually quite polite. it is funny you say that. a couple of things, looking at that makes me

cringe, to be honest the big i turned it down for two years. i kept saying i am not a donald trump. in the end they said do it how you want to. the marketing team in airasia we re very to. the marketing team in airasia were very keen for me to do this. did you get bored running airasia? is that why you began to look for these other things? i will talk in just a moment about your activities in sports and the whole diverse idea of your brand you have. is that because you got bored? my first global event was sponsoring manchester united. it was painful for me because i hate that football club. that became, umm, building a brand. based in the uk, richard gets a phenomenal amount of media.

0urselves in malaysia, it is hard to get heard. we saw sport and music as a way to build the brand. it is about priority is getting distracted. —— priorities. you are committed to aviation. but as you become more ambitious and take more on, you, watcher three, itelling the staff you have taken over a football club. —— tony fernandes. you are correct. i did it for 11 yea rs. you are correct. i did it for 11 years. i felt it was time for me to move other things. formula 1 was getting involved in a business we still have. football was a passion. there was no business sense in football. 0n there was no business sense in football. on this programme i have

said it many times publicly, focus is key. did you lose it? airasia suffered a little bit, yeah. in indonesia we lost an aircraft. 160 people died. it brought me back to reality. i felt i people died. it brought me back to reality. ifelt i needed people died. it brought me back to reality. i felt i needed to people died. it brought me back to reality. ifelt i needed to refocus. since then that has been my number one priority, exit formula 1. football is run by les and the boys. yes. is football like any other sport? two days ago it was very moral. it was a great ad for football. it is the market. if someone wants to pay £200 million for the player, that is the market. iam forthe

for the player, that is the market. i am for the free market. it has immense highs and lows. i have been incredibly high and incredibly low. it isa incredibly high and incredibly low. it is a phenomenal passion. it can be run as a business, and many are running it very well as a business. you have lost money big—time. big—time. you have lost money big—time. big-time. this is from the times newspaper us. this was written almost two years ago. it was talking about your first four years at qpr. he promised to rough up the diamond. the debts were 20 million. now they are ten times that thanks largely to money wasted on the wages of players and agencies. tony fernandes has practically nothing to show for it. i obviously disagreed that the many people went down that road. we had a solid squad, a nice academy, we are well on our way to building a new

stadium. you have not got the premier league. without it the income is not there and you will lose money. we still have good income from the paris payments. two yea rs. we income from the paris payments. two years. we want to get back to the premier league, without doubt. you also stand accused of flouting the financial rules that govern how much clu bs ca n financial rules that govern how much clubs can spend. the financial fair play rules means you are still in dispute with the football league, facing a vast fine which could kill off the club if you are forced to pay it. we will wait for that to come. ever since we have been com pletely come. ever since we have been completely aligned with the rules. i don't want a comment. there must be a plan b. it would be insane to bet the house. we would not be in the

airline business to be didn't have a plan b, c, d... that goes for qpr as well. lots of potential. five years is the life of a football club. they have been around for a long time. southampton was down in the third division. you have to be strategic. a basic problem is the stadium for queen's park rangers does not hold a thousand people. arsenal built one for 60,000 people. you cannot survive in english football without a decent stadium. what will you do? i agree. that is why we have been working busily with the mayor of london and the local authorities. your original plan was knocked back. no, it is still there. no one i

speak to things it will be built. that is what they said to daniel at totte n ha m that is what they said to daniel at tottenham and he is on to building. building in london is tougher than building an airline. with patience and the right emphasis we will get there. will you sell the club given everything we have talked about, the frank admission that you have lost money every year, will you sell queens park rangers? no. in the same way with the airline has had other and downs and people asked us to close down airasia indonesia and philippines and we said no, we are not a short—term quarterly company, iam nota not a short—term quarterly company, i am not a short—term person. we see a plan and so we will see the plan through. and i remain positively optimistic. no plans to sell. let's get back to aviation and something that you alluded to earlier. that is the personal impact and perhaps the worst thing that has happened to you in your business life, which was the crash of one of your aircraft, which i believe was flying from indonesia

to singapore. it crashed into the java sea, loss of more than 160 lives. you took it very personally. absolutely. you know, it was a body blow. probably the worst nightmare of any ceo. we are one big family in airasia. we lost four crew, two pilots and an engineer and all those families. you gave the families your mobile phone number at one point, saying if you want to reach out, if you want to call you can reach me direct. it is an extraordinary thing for a boss to do. we were sitting in malaysia, and the lawyers were saying don't go out, it is an indonesian airline, you don't need to go out. i sat there for five minutes and i said, this is our baby and brand. i have to go out. i have to go out there for the families. they all know about me. and i have

to go out there for my staff. you can't just be to go out there for my staff. you can'tjust be there for the good thing. you have to lead from the front for the bad things. was there an element of guilt in the way that you responded? 0bviously an element of guilt in the way that you responded? obviously you didn't know at the get go what caused it. it has become clear that your two pilots, i am quoting the investigation, this is not to be taken lightly, investigation, this is not to be ta ken lightly, the investigation, this is not to be taken lightly, the investigation did indicate that the pilot and the co—pilot had frankly mishandled what was a technical problem with the writer. and it raised questions about the training of your staff —— rudder. i don't think that is correct. it was cataclysmic, loads of things happening at the same time. the pilots were one element of many things that had not gone right. and so, no, there wasn't killed. my job, though, iwas and so, no, there wasn't killed. my job, though, i was determined and so, no, there wasn't killed. my job, though, iwas determined — safety is a marathon. no airline can

say it is safe. you have to keep looking at things, how to make it better. i am determined for the people we lost that we will do the very best that we can. in that sense aviation is probably more sensitive to safety issues than any other industry that i can think of. 10096. have you fully recovered from the perception fallout of what happened? in some ways we came out of it quite well, the way we handled it. and in indonesia we were very popular. from a financial perspective, we had our best year last year and we are looking very good this year. we are growing. you never come out of it. you know. it is in the back of your mind all the time. all you can do is to make sure you do the best at whatever you do. there is no guarantee. there is no guarantee, and it was me every day. does it? without a doubt, it does. you say

you are determined to keep growing. aviation is an interesting crossroads right now. you know, a lot of people travel. but the number is still forecast is a lot of potential to grow. but for you, you haven't succeeded in getting into international long haul. ithink haven't succeeded in getting into international long haul. i think you looked at flying europe... we have two airlines, airasia, easyjet and ryanair, then airasia x, which has grown to over a0 aircraft. i have a lwa ys grown to over a0 aircraft. i have always said it was a medium haul model, so, four hours to about eight 01’ model, so, four hours to about eight or nine, we do 10—hourflight. europe is a bloodbath right now. all the middle east carriers, you know, you look at the results. you are not interested in europe to asia? not at the moment. let them clean it up. the competition will sort itself out. then we will go in. we are happy going to asia and australia

and creating something we haven't before, and hub in bangkok and kuala lumpur. if you want to grow rapidly in asia it means, and i think your strategic view is the same, it means you are going to have to get deep into china, and the sort of secondary and tertiary airports in china. correct. the problem there is the chinese government clearly favours its own big three state airlines. i don't. .. how favours its own big three state airlines. idon't... how are favours its own big three state airlines. i don't... how are you going to move into china? we are the first airline to be given a foreign airline, the first foreign airline to be given a local licence. china and certainly the state government see the tremendous value we give to the tertiary cities. we have gone into cities that have never had direct connectivity. so, china values us. asia is not a one trick pony. india, we are also in. the

first airline pony. india, we are also in. the firstairline in pony. india, we are also in. the first airline in india and china with a fantastic south—east asian market and japan starting in two weeks. we are nicely covered in asia. a transport analyst in singapore says the risk for airasia is that it will spread itself too thin. that has been set for 16 yea rs. thin. that has been set for 16 years. i have been written off many times. it could come true. could do. 16 years... i have been through everything, earthquakes, bird flu, tsunamis, hardtalk. we are still here. before the end, as an aviation boss i need to ask you about emissions and your view of your responsibilities when it comes to climate change. the paris accord tells us that there will be a wholesale de—carbonisation of the world economy by 2050. aviation is one sector which, unless technology fundamentally changes, cannot

de—carbonise. fundamentally changes, cannot de-carbonise. well, no, aviation gives off 3% of nitrous oxides. right now. the share of aviation is emissions is going to go exponentially up as other people massively cut their emissions. yours, relatively... as they do. that is really out of my hands. the manufacturers will have to do it. from our part we have the newest engines in terms of the new ge engines. and we probably have the most seats per square foot of any airline. so we are doing. you mean you cram people in like cattle? not like cattle but we don't put them in like cattle but we don't put them in like fi rstclass like cattle but we don't put them in like firstclass for instance. we are flying economically well and we work well with aircraft. do you think the climate change moves that are being made is that passengers, looking forward to 2050, will have to accept

they will have to pay effectively as sort of carbon price on the airline ticket price? 10096. i think that goes without doubt. i think the manufacturers have to find ways. we are working with a manufacturer who has taken a formula one technique and trying to establish that on brea ks to and trying to establish that on breaks to use that power. all our vehicles on the ground will be electric very soon. so we are working with the manufacturers to find ways. we have a lightweight seat which is three kilograms versus a normal seat of eight kilograms. final thought for you which takes us back to the beginning of this conversation. i wonder whether one of the life and business lessons you have learned through these 30 dramatic years is that you from now on will focus like a laser beam on your core business, aviation, or will you develop an interest? while iamat will you develop an interest? while i am at airasia that is my priority andi i am at airasia that is my priority and i am laserfocused on that. i won't be doing this for ever. you

know, and when i do i have the dreams and passions. but they have to be done one at a time, or get the right management to do it. airasia, we are the lowest cost airline in the world is by far. we still have the world is by far. we still have the best margins. a lot of growth. i don't think we are spreading ourselves thin. and i am very excited. 0ne ourselves thin. and i am very excited. one great aspect of aviation is data and that is going to bea aviation is data and that is going to be a very exciting times for airlines because we have fantastic data. if you want to share with us your next dream, do you want to do that? i would love to do low-cost hospitals. that would be a dream. my father was a very left—wing doctor and never believed in private medicine. i believe medicine is as inefficient as airlines were when i came in from the music business 16 yea rs came in from the music business 16 years ago. and when you move into that sector, we will have you back on the show. but for now, tony fernandez, thanks for being on hardtalk. thanks very much. thank you, tony.

good morning. hot on the heels of hurricane harvey comes irma, and this has the potential to be a catastrophic hurricane. already a category 5, we have sustained winds of 185mph, potentially gusting to 220mph. you can see quite clearly the eye of the storm here on the satellite picture. it's notjust the strength of the winds and the volume of the rain, it's also a significant storm surge that's heading towards the leeward isles. the storm surge is where, underneath this area of low pressure, it literally lifts the surface of the sea by as much as 9—11 feet, descending across these caribbean islands. so certainly we'll need to keep you updated on developments of that storm.

back closer to home, things are a little quieter. we have got more of a westerly direction to the source of our air now, that means slightly fresher and it does mean that first thing in a morning we could actually see temperatures into single figures in more rural spots. so it will be a chilly start but potentially a dry one, with some sunshine coming through. there will be a scattering of showers into the far north—west with more of a significant breeze here. but the rest of the sheltered south—eastern area should see some sunshine and, as a consequence, we should get some warmth as well. highest values possibly up to 20 degrees, as opposed to 1a to 17 further north and west. now, as we move out of wednesday, into thursday, the winds will strengthen again, and we will see more significant rain. an area of low pressure will move in from the atlantic. it's going to bring heavy rain to scotland and northern ireland, eventually moving through the borders into the north of england and north wales. further south of that, it's a drier story, but it does mean a pretty disappointing day

on thursday afternoon in scotland. underneath the cloud, with wind and the rain, 13—15 degrees at the very best. some of the rain quite heavy close to the lake district, and stretching over the higher ground of wales. sheltered eastern areas should cling on to some sunshine and, if this happens, we could see 19—20 degrees perhaps across the southeast through london. then further west, with more of a fresher westerly breeze, a little more cloud and a slightly fresher feel. with that low pressure, with its front, sweeps south and east, during thursday night, into friday. it takes a spell of significant rain with it as well. wrapped around that low, there will be some squally showers. so some rain to come for england and wales, for a time. some of the showers heavy, with some hail and some thunder into the far north—west. and temperatures, again, pretty disappointing. i can offer you something a little better as we move into the start of the weekend. drier through england and wales with a scattering of showers into the far north—west. take care. this is bbc news. i'm david eades. our top stories: hurricane irma, one of the most powerful atlantic storms ever recorded, is battering islands in the caribbean.

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